Series: Neon Genesis Evangelion

Craftsmanship: 9.7 out of 10

- PERFECT sculpt with beautiful paint

- Ingenius articulation for lots of movement and posability

- Insane amount of extra parts and accessories

Playability: 9.0 out of 10

- Highly posable and playable with lots of articulation

- Tons of accessories and extra pieces for play...

- .... which are easily lost

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Evangelion Unit 01 Test Type

by Kaiyodo Toys

One of the most popular animes ever, Neon Genesis Evangelion recently came back into public interest with the release of the two movies. The excellent mix of human drama, massive mech-alien battles and Biblical overtones made this series highly watchable, if somewhat confusing - the underlying themes of hope and finding courage in one's self propel the show far above average, undoubtedly one of the more intelligent animes ever brought to the western shores.

Evangelion spawned my interest in anime. I've been a huge fan ever since I saw the first episode years back - and I was thrilled when import company Kaiyodo's intensely cool Evangelion figures hit Western shores for the first time a couple of years back. Even with the higher-than-average price (to be expected with import toys), these toys are worth every penny and show enormous ingenuity and creativity.

Kaiyodo have done a perfect job capturing the pose and movement of the Evangelion in this figure – it looks less of an anime-mech-robot than most anime robot toys, with more of a human shape and more human movement, as present in the source material. The paint on the regular Unit 01 figure is fine, well applied and accurate to the show – though not as nice as the paint on the metallic variant, which has a stunning metallic purple replacing the normal purple. The metallic variants are favored by this collector over the whole Evangelion series – they look that extra bit special. (I'll come back to the multiple variants in a moment.)

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Like every figure in this series, Evangelion Unit 01 has a ton of accessories – Kaiyodo has included weapons, extra body parts including hands and heads, even an umbilical cord which connects to the Eva to supply it with 'power'. Unit 01 has a pistol, a positron rifle, and the progressive knife (an early model, if I'm not mistaken) all detailed and painted excellently. The additional hands and heads have plugs made of a rubber-plastic which wont easily break, making them durable to put on and take off the figure with ease; each extra part is posed differently to the others, so that the extra hands can hold different weapons or poses, and the head's mouth is open or shut. These are all created ingeniously, making the figure even more fun and more playable; but my favorite accessory is the tiny Kaoru/Kaworu, who fits neatly into Unit 01's hand to recreate the final scene from the 24th episode – very nifty, it shows a lot of creativity on behalf of the toymakers.

Articulation makes the figure shine even more; the Evangelion figures are as articulated as possible, not just for quantity but quality - Eva Unit 01 is articulated at the wrists, midsection, knees, neck, feet, twice at the shoulders and more, all that work together to assume any pose imaginable, from standing and firing the Eva weapons, to going berserker, to crouching on the ground to sniper a far away angel, even to running/attacking with the progressive knife. The articulation on this action figure series is so good it apparently inspired newer figures, like the recent Marvel Legends featuring articulation similar to the Evas, like the double-shoulder joints, which allow the figure to hold it's hands together and hold guns double handed. Although the original Evangelions didn't include elbow joints, the newer figures do, and also feature an additional third joint at the shoulders. (These are found in the new packaging 'shell' packaging and are all metallic.)

This series is full of variants and new additions - starting with the normal Evangelion Unit 01 Test Type, there is a metallic variant, a clear variant made of clear plastic, and a rare glow in the dark variant. There is also a boxed Evangelion Unit 01 EX, the same figure with even more accessories, including extra guns and weapons and hands, plus the new packaging which replaces the old carded Evangelions with a 'shell' design, mimicking the Evangelion holding chambers (not the exact name, but I forget) from the show. Eva Unit 01 isn't the only figure in the series with a ton of variants, but it has the most variants of all – I'm certain there are more than just listed here, although I only own the original metallic figure.

This is an excellent figure in an excellent series, and an absolute joy for Evangelion fans who want to own a miniature version of their favorite onscreen mechs. Evangelion Unit 01 is so poseable that many collectors have bought more than one to show off on their shelves – there are just so many awesome poses to put them in, it's awesome. Playability is also good, with plenty of poses and movements, although these figures aren't child-friendly – the accessories will be easily lost unless kept in a safe place, and the figure seems a little fragile – It wouldn't stand up to really rough play like other figures will. Other than that, there is almost nothing to complain about – Evangelion Unit 01 rocks.

- Shocka

(February 13 , 2003)